When as thine eye hath chose the dame, And stall'd the deer that thou would'st strike, Let reason rule things worthy blame,

As well as fancy, partial tike:

Take counsel of some wiser head,
Neither too young, nor yet unwed.
And when thou com'st thy tale to tell,
Smooth not thy tongue with filed talk,
Lest she some subtle practice swell;
(A cripple soon can find a halt :)

But plainly say thou lov'st her well,
And set thy person forth to sell.
And to her will frame all thy ways;
Spare not to spend,-and chiefly there
Where thy desert may merit praise,
By ringing always in her ear:"

The strongest castle, tower, and town,
The golden bullet beats it down.

Serve always with assured trust,
And in thy suit be humble, true;
Unless thy lady prove unjust,
Seek never thou to choose anew:

When time shall serve, be thou not slack
To proffer, though she put thee back.

What though her frowning brows be bent,
Her cloudy looks will clear ere night;
And then too late she will repent

That she dissembled her delight;
And twice desire, ere it be day,
That with such scorn she put away.

What though she strive to try her strength,
And ban and brawl, and say thee nay,
Her feeble force will yield at length,
When craft hath taught her thus to say,-
Had women been so strong as men,
In faith you had not had it then.

The wiles and guiles that women work,
Dissembled with an outward shew,
The tricks and toys that in them lurk,
The cock that treads them shall not know.
Have you not heard it said full oft,
A woman's nay doth stand for nought?
Think, women love to match with men,
And not to live so like a saint:
Here is no heaven; they holy then
Begin, when age doth them attaint.
Were kisses all the joys in bed,
One woman would another wed.

But soft; enough,-too much I fear;
For if my lady hear my song,
She will not stick to ring mine ear,
To teach my tongue to be so long:
Yet will she blush, here be it said,
To hear her secrets so bewray'd.

XVII.

Take, oh, take those lips away,

That so sweetly were forsworn; And those eyes, the break of day, Lights that do mislead the morn: But my kisses bring again, Seals of love, but seal'd in vain.

Hide, oh, hide those hills of snow

Which thy frozen bosom bears, On whose tops the pinks that grow Are of those that April wears: But first set my poor heart free, Bound in those icy chains by thee.

XVIII.

Let the bird of loudest lay,
On the sole Arabian tree,
Herald sad and trumpet be,
To whose sound chaste wings obey.

But thou shrieking harbinger,
Foul pre-currer of the fiend,
Augur of the fever's end,

To this troop come thou not near!

From this session interdict
Every fowl of tyrant wing,
Save the eagle, feather'd king:
Keep the obsequy so strict.

Let the priest in surplice white,
That defunctive music can,
Be the death-divining swan,
Lest the requiem lack his right.

And thou, treble-dated crow,
That thy sable gender mak'st
With the breath thou giv'st and tak'st,
'Mongst our mourners shalt thou go.

AAA

P. 723, c. 1, 1. 32. Paler for sorrow than her milk-white dove,] The line preceding this is lost. MALONE.

Id. c. 2, 1. 27. Sweet rose, &c.] This seems to have been intended for a dirge to be sung by Venus on the death of Adonis. MALONE.

This note shows how the clearest head may be led away by a favourite hypothesis. Unless the poet had completely altered the whole subject of his poem on Venus and Adonis, which is principally by the entreaties of the Goddess to the insensible swain, how could she be represented as saying,

"I crave nothing of thee still."

The greater part of it is employed in describing her craving. BOSWELL. Id. 1. 28.--faded in the spring!] The verb fade throughout these little fragments, &c. is always spelt vaded, either in compliance with ancient pronunciation, or in consequence of a primitive which perhaps modern lexicographers may feel some reluctance to acknowledge. They tell us that we owe this word to the French fade; but I see no reason why we may not as well impute its origin to the Latin vado, which equally serves to indicate departure, motion, and evanescence. STEEVENS.

Id. c. 2, 1. 2. My heart doth charge the watch ;] The meaning of this phrase is not very clear. STEEVENS.

Perhaps the poet, wishing for the approach of morning, enjoins the watch to hasten through their nocturnal duty. MALONE.

Id. l. 15. —— each minute seems a moon;] The

old copy reads-each minute seems an hour. The want of rhyme in the corresponding line shows that it must be corrupt. I have therefore not hesitated to adopt an emendation proposed by Mr Steevens-each minute seems a moon; i. e. month. So, in Antony and Cleopatra:

"Which had superfluous kings for mes

Id.

away;

Now fate does rigidly her dues regain

And every moment is an age of pain." Dr Young, however, was no needy borrower, and therefore the coincidence between these passages may be regarded as the effect of accident. There are, however, certain hyperbolical expressions which the inamoratoes of all ages have claimed as right of commonage. STEEVENS.

1. 64. Love's denying, &c.] A denial of love, a breach of faith, &c. being the cause of all these misfortunes. The Passionate Pilgrim and Weelkes's book have-Love is dying, andHeart's denying. The reading of the text is found in England's Helicon, except that it has -Love is, and Faith is. Renying is from the French renier, to forswear. MALONE. Id. 1. 67. Causer of this.] Read-'Cause of this; i. e. Because of this. STEEVENS.

The old copy is right. The word causer is again used by Shakspeare in Love's Labour's Lost:

“And study too, the causer of your vow." MALONE.

P. 724, c. 1, l. 1. All my merry jigs are quite forgot,] A jig was a metrical composition. So, in Bussy d'Ambois, a tragedy by Chapman, 1607: "Tis one of the best jigs that ever was acted." MALONE.

Jigs, as the word is commonly used, would do as well in this passage. I cannot help wishing that such jigs or metrical compositions had been quite forgot, rather than they should have been attributed to Shakspeare. Bos

WELL.

Id. l. 4. There a nay-] So The Passionate Pilgrim Annoy, Weelkes's Madrigals. MALONE. Id. 1. 19. My shepherd's pipe can sound no deal,] i. e. in no degree, more or less. Thus, Fairfax: "This charge some deal thee haply honour may. STEEVENS.

Id. 1. 27. Through harkless ground.] This is the reading furnished by Weelkes's copy. The other old editions have heartless ground. If heartless ground be the true reading, it means, I think, uncultivated, desclated ground, cor

responding in its appearance with the unhappy state of its owner. Au hypercritic will perhaps ask, how can the ground be harkless, if sighs resound? The answer is, that no other noise is heard but that of sighs:

"The birds do not sing, the bells ring not," &c. MALONE.

Id. l. 54. with filed talk,] With studied or polished language. So, in Ben Jonson's Verses on our author:

"In his well-turned and true-filed lines," MALONE.

Id. c. 2, l. 8. And ban and brawl? To ban is to curse. So, in King Richard III.:

"You bade me ban, and will you have me leave?" MALONE.

Id. 1. 47. But thou shrieking harbinger,

Foul pre-currer of the fiend,

Augur of the fever's end,] So, in Hamlet:
And even the like precurse of fierce

events,

As harbingers preceding still the fates
And prologue to the omen coming on-
Have heaven and earth together de-
monstrated

Unto our climatures and countrymen."
The shrieking harbinger here addressed, is
the skritch owl, the foul precurrer of death.
So, in A Midsuminer-Night's Dream:

"Now the wasted brands do glow,

While the scritch-owl, scritching loud,
Puts the wretch that lies in woe,

In remembrance of a shroud."

Id. 1. 56. That defunctive music can,] That understands funereal music. To con in Saxon

signifies to know. The modern editions'read: "That defunctive music ken."

Id. 1. 60. That thy sable gender mak'st

MALONE.

With the breath thou giv'st and tak'st,] I suppose this uncouth expression means, that the crow, or raven, continues its race by the breath it gives to them as its parent, and by that which it takes from other animals: i. e. by first producing its young from itself, and then providing for their support by depredation. Thus, in King John:

and vast confusion waits

(As doth a raven on a sick-fallen beast) The imminent decay of wrested pomp." This is the best I can make of the passage. STEEVENS

P.726, c. 1, 7. 12. But in them it were a wonder.] So extraordinary a phenomenon as hearts remote, yet not asunder, &c. would have excited admiration, had it been found anywhere else

Id.

except in these two birds. In them it was not
wonderful. MALONE.

1. 14. That the turtle saw his right
Flaming in the phoenix' sight

I suppose we should read light: i. e. the turtle saw al the day he wanted in the eyes of the phoenix. So, Antony speaking to Cleopatra:

O thou day o' the world,

Chain my arm'd neck!"

Again, in The Merchant of Venice:

Bass. We should hold day with the Antipodes,

If you would walk in absence of the sux. Por. Let me give light, but let me not be light." STEEVENS.

I do not perceive any need of change. The Turtle saw those qualities which were his right, which were peculiarly appropriated to him, in the phoenix.-Light certainly corre sponds better with the word flaming in the next line; but Shakspeare seldom puts his coparisons on four feet. MALONE.

Id. i. 17. Property was thus appall d.

That the self was not the same:] This communication of appropriated qualities alarmed the power that presides over property. Finding that the self was not the same, be began to fear that nothing would remain distinct and individual; that all things would become common. MALONE.

Id. 1. 23. To themselves yet either neither, &c.]
So, in Drayton's Mortimeriados, 1596:
fire seem'd to be water, water flame,
Either or neither, and yet both the same."
MALONE.

Id. c. 2, l. 3. Love hath reason, reason none,

Id.

If what parts can so remain.] Love is reasonable, and reason is folly [has no reason. if two that are disunited from each other, cza yet remain together and undivided. MALONE 1.5. Whereupon it made this threne-] This funeral song. So, in Kendal's poems, 1577: "Of verses, threnes, and epitaphs,

Full fraught with tears of teene."

A book entitled David's Threanes, by J Heywood, was published in 1620. Two years afterwards it was reprinted under the title of David's Tears: the former title probably

was discarded as obsolete. For this information I am indebted to Dr Farmer. MALONE.

By the kindness of my friend, Sir Mark Masterman Sykes, the possessor of this singularly rare volume, I was furnished with an opportunity of inspecting it, and ascertaining the accuracy with which these verses had been reprinted. BosWELL.